Notes

I'm beginning to like the new suite in Graduate House. Sure, it was a
pain boxing up all of my stuff, carting them up one floor, and lugging
them down stairs for a total horizontal displacement of maybe 30
meters that included an impassable wall... but it's nice having a view
of the Real World instead of the courtyard. I always felt as if I was
gazing at the navel of Graduate House. We didn't get a lot of sun in
the old suite, so I kept my shades closed all the time rather than
have people see into my room. Now we face out, but at a decent height,
so I'm allowing myself to keep the shades open and the sunshine coming
through.

I'm excited about renting the new place, though. I just received the
financial statement from the bank. They got it to me in three business
days instead of 7, which makes me quite relieved as I had been cutting
the timing a little too close. I hope the university doesn't shut down
during Reading Week, which I had also forgotten about, as I need the
letter of employment. I also hope that Wayne's letter of employment
and financial statement make it through in time. I'm looking forward
to having my own place.

That said, I'm not too worried. If it falls through, that just means
that the world has an even better place in store for me. Maybe I
should keep looking instead of having my heart set on this one place.
I'll do that when I have time again. I have other things to take care
of right now.

This week was more intense than most in terms of personal drama, but I
think that's subsiding now as I've gotten the hang of things. I felt
as if I slowed down a lot in terms of research, but looking back, I
see this week as paying a short-term cost in order to gain long-term
improvement. This week I also came to appreciate my friends even more,
and I look forward to being even more a part of their lives as well as
reawakening and expanding my other friendships.

I usually advocate focusing on the positive, but this time I made
myself focus on the negative. It was an interesting exercise, and I
ended up filling a small slip of paper front and back with reasons why
it's better this way. That makes it so much easier to focus on other
things, too... =)

Next week is going to be intense. I have an important meeting on
Monday. On Wednesday, I'm skipping a symposium on sustainability in
order to do a day of service, volunteering to help the hungry and
homeless. I cancelled my ski trip for Friday in order to spend more
time on paperwork and thesis, and to catch up with other friends. I
also hope to propose the ethics protocols for my experiment and hook
up the back end to the front end of my prototype.

Good week behind me, good week ahead... Life is good.

Random Emacs symbol: mail-extr-disable-voodoo - Variable: *If it is a
regexp, names matching it will never be modified.

An article in the Small Business magazine led me to
Barter Network, a Toronto-based
business-to-business trade exchange that's definitely worth checking
out. I've sent the paperwork for the off-campus work permit, and I
should look into how I can register as an independent consultant. I'll
focus on my thesis first, of course, but this looks like a useful
resource and something to recommend to others...

I'd love to hear about any questions, comments, suggestions or links that you might have. Your comments will not be posted on this website immediately, but will be e-mailed to me first. You can use this form to get in touch with me, or e-mail me at [email protected] .

Page: 2007.02.18

Updated: 2007-02-1908:49:3308:49:33-0500

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